Maternal Instincts
by Darthishtar
Summary: Posting here until ff.n has a section for The Host: A year after the souls begin to be implanted, a widowed mother comes to terms with the possibility that her newborn daughter might be one of the hosts.
1. Chapter 1

I was a typical mother in my horrifyingly atypical world. I wasn't sure that I could even call it my world any more since every day brought more evidence of the infestation that had taken our society away from us. Still, there were far too many familiar things in this world to think of it as anything else.

There were tragedies and triumphs, things to fear and things to appreciate. More than anything, there were many things for which I could be grateful. It took me four months to thank God that Josue died a free man rather than one of the centipedes' hosts. It took me even longer to be grateful that he had left me behind, alone and pregnant in a world turned on its head.

Noemi Anne Valdiviezo, named for Josue's mother and my sister, came six months after we buried Josue and I only had my green-eyed midwife and friend Lily to help me through the labor. Brigham and Women's was the only completely free hospital left in Boston. In the year since the first sighting of the invaders, every other hospital had welcomed its Healers to its staff in hopes that they would be spared. I had driven all the way from Salem with my contractions coming too quickly, only to nearly deliver my firstborn on the doorstep of the ER.

It took less than an hour to deliver my daughter, but it only took me five heartbeats to feel grateful that when my husband had died free, he left me this perfect creature. The midwife only took her from me long enough to cut the cord and ensure that she was healthy before returning _mijita_ to me. Noemi demonstrated that she had her _papi_'s lungs by squalling and I wept in that moment because I had forgotten how to hope.

Like a typical mother, I spent as much time as I could in the deserted nursery, singing everything from _Naranja Dulce_ to old Beatles songs so that she would know the best of both worlds. I must have counted her fingers and toes a thousand times between the night of her birth and the time that Lily's brother brought us home. I caressed her dark hair and memorized every feature that reminded me of myself. Much as I disliked the idea, I accepted the gift of baby formula because I would not chance being too malnourished to feed my daughter when times grew harder.

James helped us settle in, got the dilapidated furnace working and then left us both with a smile and a promise to return soon. There was no telling if it was safe to be here, but we would stay while we could.

It was in that first lonely night, when my womb still ached for Noemi and the full weight of my new responsibility pushed tears from my eyes that I made my discovery. At my request, James had set Noemi's crib next to my bed and I fell asleep listening to the soft whistle of her breath.

For now, for the first time in months, I could pretend that life could go on. Finally at the only home that I had known as Josue's _esposita_, I was able to sleep within moments of letting my head hit the pillow.

&

I awoke suddenly less than ten minutes later as if someone had called my name, but the only noises were the murmur of the wind through the gutters and Noemi's quiet breathing. Still, there was an uncomfortable sense that I was being watched. I took a quick, almost furtive tour of the house, but there was nothing there. There was not even traffic on Carpenter Street.

I returned, half-convinced that it was all in my mind. I had been afraid of being Sought out since I learned of the invasion. Noemi was in the first generation that might grow up with hosts for kindergarten teachers or police officers. There was no telling if they might have their hunger sated and if there would be a stopping point. The optimists said that we would find a way to live in peaceful coexistence. The realists believed that we might last the year.

Noemi was squirming in her crib when I returned and I immediately reached into the crib. My arms shifted her into a cradling position as I began running through the checklist of what might have awakened her. She did not smell as if she needed a diaper change and it wasn't time for her feeding yet. Maybe she'd just gotten lonely as I had.

It was a temptation to replace her in the crib and let myself get some sleep before she _really_ needed me, but the weight of her against my arms was comforting. I turned on a low light so I wouldn't stumble over something in the dark and retreated to the rocking chair that Josue had bought three days before he was killed.

The night was too quiet. In the days before, there would have been a dog barking or the Armenian neighbors arguing. I'd have closed the window and tried to drown out the sound with some racket of my own. Instead, the wind whined at me and Noemi squirmed impatiently.

I had never been one for singing—Josue had been the one to teach me the songs of his youth while I botched the Spanish and made him laugh with my sense of pitch. The unsettled feeling that had woken me up made it impossible for me to think of a suitable lullaby, so I picked the first thing that came into my mind.

"_When I find myself in times of trouble, mother Mary comes to me,  
speaking words of wisdom, let it be.  
And in my hour of darkness she is standing right in front of me,  
speaking words of wisdom, let it be._

_ "Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be.  
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be."_

Noemi hadn't heard good music yet, so she sighed a little and quieted. I looked down to give her a grateful smile for putting up with the best she had...

The words died in my throat and I nearly dropped the only person I had left in utter shock. Instead, I stood as quick as was possible and staggered to the crib. Noemi squalled in protest, but I set her down and backed away so quickly that I fell over the edge of the mattress.

Noemi was still howling when I came to myself, hugging a wall of the kitchen and hyperventilating so badly that dark spots flung themselves into my field of vision. I tried to slow my breathing, but it alternated between sobs and gasps and I finally slumped down the wall until I found a more stable position on the floor.

The girl was still upstairs, screaming in confusion and what must have been fright, but I couldn't pull myself together. Instead, I covered my ears and bawled for my own reasons.

_ And when the broken hearted people living in the world agree,  
there will be an answer, let it be.  
For though they may be parted there is still a chance that they will see,  
there will be an answer. let it be._

_Let it be, let it be ..._

Lily had cared for Noemi as if she were a child of her own. She had been more than patient with my inexperience and had wrapped my daughter securely in enough blankets to ward off an Alaskan winter.

Somewhere between all of Lily's ministrations and my maternal selfishness, someone had taken my daughter from me. I had spent so much time recognizing Josue's nose and my bow mouth that I had overlooked the pink scar tissue on her neck.

Whenever it had happened, there was no mistaking the silver gleam in her dark eyes. I had awoken with the feeling that I was not alone because there was someone else in my daughter's mind.

My daughter was only five days old. She wouldn't have been strong enough to ward off the creature. Maybe everything I had seen and felt between us since the beginning had been a lie because whatever was wailing disconsolately, it was not my daughter.

I had no idea how long I huddled there against the wall, cowering like a frightened child, but when my hands slid down my neck and uncovered my ears, I could hear only a vaguely sulky whimpering from the other room.

_ That's right. The game is over._

It was too late to call Lily or James. My family was in Lowell, but they didn't know about Noemi yet. It was too dangerous to let word of an uninfested child to get around.

But Lily had insisted that I could call at any time. My hand reached for my cell phone, but I was halfway through dialing the number when another thought struck me.

Lily had been with Noemi almost as much as I was, maybe even more often. If I called on her for help, I might catch the same silver gleam in her eye as she tried to tell me comforting lies. Maybe it had been James who implanted her. There were rumors of people being implanted and returning to work the next day with stories about a 24-hour stomach bug. It could have happened at any time.

It might not have been either of them. Maybe Brigham and Women's called themselves the last free hospital out of naivete or blindness. Or maybe it had all been a lure.

The front of my cotton nightgown was soaked through, since my body had responded to that thing's bawling. Startled from my state of shock by that simple thing, I folded my arms stubbornly over my swollen breasts as if to cut off the thing's food supply.

I made my way back to the bedroom, shuddering either from cold or anger. It was nearly impossible to distinguish the two.

The creature was flailing its arms, reaching for comforts it didn't deserve. Its face was screwed up in preparation for another yell, but I stepped back. If it was smart enough to take my daughter from me, it should be smart enough to know I wasn't going to be fooled by its needy-baby display. If I could just convince my body to think the same way, I'd be fine.

_ No, not fine._

"You want this?" I demanded, uncrossing my arms. "You want to live? You give her back."

It resumed its wailing, the volume rising to earsplitting levels. It was crying so hard that Noemi's body twitched spasmodically with the effort. It was said that breastfeeding increased hormones that encouraged a mother's nurturing side. Instead, the creature's need for me only infuriated me.

"I'm not like you!" I shouted, competing in volume and pitch with the damned shrieks that it thought would make a difference. "This isn't for you and I'm not going to pretend otherwise. I don't care if you have to die..."

The enormity of that lie brought on the tears once more and I found it impossible to speak. Instead, I turned away and let the thing see the force of my grief in how hard my shoulders shook.

The thing finally fell silent. Maybe it was shocked by how uncooperative I was. Maybe it was contemplating another method of attack. Maybe it was too exhausted to cry any more. I was starting to understand that last sentiment.

"I can't..." I inhaled sharply because I still couldn't breathe normally. "I can't do this to her. If there's any part of her in there..."

I whirled to stare at it accusatorily. "Do you even know who you took away from me?" I demanded. "Did you know her name is Noemi Anne? Did you know that her _abuela _lives in Oaxaca and is named Noemi, too? Do you know that her father insisted on playing Shakira music twice a week and that he was a lawyer? Does it even matter that she was named after my sister Anne who's now one of you and is a Seeker who calls herself Rides the Wind? Do you even _care?_"

The thing didn't answer. Of course it didn't answer. It was limited by the motor and verbal skills of someone who couldn't even roll over yet.

"I'm not like you," I reiterated between ragged breaths.

_ Then kill me_ was the unspoken challenge in the thing's unnaturally expressive eyes. Noemi may have not learned too many facial expressions yet, but this thing was obviously not a beginner.

"I'm not like you," I repeated. "I wanted her more than anything and I'm not throwing her away just because you are trespassing. I can't just stop being her mother and until I know how to deal with you..."

There were no words for what I was asking myself to do. I couldn't explain to it or to myself why I was showing compassion. The only way I could explain any of this was to be a mother.

Reluctantly, I reached for the thing in the crib. It responded to my touch exactly as Noemi had and for half a minute, I thought I had imagined it. Still, as it suckled, I could not forget that demon glint of silver and I found myself begrudging the creature every breath it took on Noemi's behalf.

&

_ Anne recommended group therapy. It had supposedly done wonders for her in her post-scumbag years and she was the sort to recommend something until you tried it out of sheer exasperation. I wasn't something I looked forward to, but as she pointed out, I wasn't exactly in the best shape. I was hormonal, overwhelmed by the upcoming deadlines at work and I was recently widowed. She reasoned that I would spend as much money on therapy as I did on my monthly supply of Haagen-Dasz. I could not argue with that, so I began attending weekly meetings in Needham. It was a long drive, but helped to clear my head after a long day at the school.  
_

_ The meetings themselves were mostly a joke. None of us was extroverted enough to make real progress and the counselor was patronizing. When I did speak openly of my troubles, it was because I could no longer endure them._

_ In order to make the most of our weekly sessions, the victims of this group therapy met once a week for either drinks or pizza. Jacob with the identity crisis was a fan of anchovies. Matt-the-recently-divorced groused over the quality of the beer and would take any jalapeno that he could get his hands on. Sean was the one who had moved from Ireland to marry the girl he loved only to have her leave him for another woman; he drank anything he could get his hands on and didn't mind the puddle of grease in the middle of every pie._

_ Lydia and I were the only women in the group and, by chance, we were both pregnant. Lydia worked in Public Relations and her husband was a well-respected professor of literature at Northeastern, which meant that she tended to speak very formally about her woes. We had yet to hear anything that suggested that she needed therapy; more likely than not, she was one of those women who scheduled group therapy between their Pilates class and their pedicure._

_ Tonight, we were the last to leave. Jacob had been too much of a gentleman to let us pay, but we were abandoned with the last few slices of meat-lovers' pizza and our third glasses of Dr. Pepper. Neither of us seemed to have anything left to say, but neither of us made a move to leave. Lydia wore her baby bump under a stylish dress that made her look as if she took the Angelina Jolie approach to maternity. She would never need a forklift to get out of bed, but if she did put on an ounce of unnecessary weight, she'd do it with style._

_ Tonight, she didn't seem quite so chic. She was wearing plain black flats and her red hair was in a low ponytail. I took it to mean that either she was becoming more comfortable with the lot of us or she was having an off day._

_ I was halfway through my drink when she tilted her chin and eyed the bulge under my Red Sox t-shirt. "When's your due date?"_

"_November 24," I replied. "If I'm lucky, I'll get out of going to my sister's house for Thanksgiving and spend it with my kid instead."_

_ She made a half-hearted attempt at smiling. "Michael lets his mother do all of the cooking," she confided. "He comes from a long line of spectacular Italian cooks and never lets me forget it when I burn grilled cheese sandwiches. Is your sister much better?"_

"_My sister's a vegetarian and spends most of the day glowering at everyone who dares to look longingly at Butterball ads," I pointed out. "I love Anne to death, but the first thing I do after Thanksgiving at her house is to find a Big Mac."_

_ She sucked with her straw at the bottom of the glass, somehow making the sound dainty. I decided to discard the straw and drained the rest of my glass in one long pull._

"_What about you?"_

"_December 3," she said with the same lackluster smirk. "I have a while to go yet."_

_ I was beginning to wonder if she showed any enthusiasm for anything. Maybe that was why she came to therapy._

"_Is Michael excited?"_

_ That finally broke through, but not in the way I had intended. Instead, she looked quickly away and pursed her lips so hard that they turned white. Instinctively, I reached for her hand in case she needed something to grip.  
_

"_He was," she said finally._

_ For another minute, there was no explanation forthcoming, but she found a single tissue in her Louis Vuitton bag to dab at her eyes._

_ Finally, she left the tissue wadded on the side of her plate and dropped her hand to rest on her stomach._

"_We found out that there will be some..." She blanched before uttering the next words. "...Defects. It's possible that our baby won't live long and the doctors think that it might be best to abort the pregnancy now."_

_ Acid coated the back of my throat, but I kept a firm grip on her hand. "What do you think?"_

"_Michael thinks that it would be more humane this way," she said evasively. "I wouldn't carry the child to term only to lose it. I wouldn't grow as emotionally attached and there's no reason to believe that I won't be able to have another."_

_ From the sound of it, what he was expecting her to do was anything but humane. Before I could even repeat my question, she finally met my gaze again._

"_I don't know how long he'd live," she admitted, "but what makes Michael think that I'm not emotionally attached to our son now? He has a personality of his own and I've been looking forward to seeing how it develops. Even if he lives just a few hours, I want him to be mine and I want to see myself in him. Is that too much to ask?"_

_ I wasn't sure if she was desperately delusional about how difficult it would be or if she was much stronger than I had suspected. Either way, her logic resonated with my own._

"_It's not too much to ask at all," I agreed._

_&_

I awoke in the early morning light to find the outside world covered in snow and someone knocking impatiently on the door. A quick to my left revealed that the other was still asleep. I peeled myself off the mattress and pulled my old red robe over the nightgown that I had been too tired to change last night.

I could see Lily through the small windowpane on the door and my first instinct was to stay out of sight, but human or not, she wouldn't be fooled by that. I pulled the front door open instead and tried for some kind of facial expression other than numb shock.

Again, Lily wasn't fooled. Her hand went to my cheek immediately as if she were my mother checking for a fever.

"Rebekah, you look wrung out," she said frankly. "Do you want me to come help tonight?"

I didn't answer until she had met my gaze with those steady green eyes. When I was satisfied that I couldn't see even a hint of silver there, I shook my head.

"Come with me."

She closed the door quietly behind her as if trying to keep from breaking anything. She was already treating this as a crisis and she didn't even know what was waiting for us in the bedroom.

As soon as we entered the room, she went to it, checking it over. Having found nothing wrong, she settled back on her heels and turned once more to look at my haggard expression.

"What happened?" she asked quietly.

I said nothing, but pulled its eyelid gently up until she could see the mark of the creature. Immediately, her hands went to her mouth to muffle a dismayed cry and I repented of every suspicious thought I had allowed last night. A moment later, she joined me on the edge of the bed, too weak-kneed to stand.

"When?"

"I don't know," I muttered, voice cracking on the last word. "I only saw it last night. I was half-convinced it was your doing."

She didn't condemn me for it in anything but expression, but I felt the need to explain myself.

"I wasn't thinking right," I stammered on. "I tried to convince myself to let it die and I wouldn't feed it for a while..."

This time her silence was more of a condemnation than anything.

"I fed it again," I insisted. "I don't know what to do with it except treat it as my own."

"It's possible that Noemi is in there," she protested weakly.

I wanted to shake my head, but instead lifted my shoulders in a shrug or a cringe. "I may not know for years," I countered. "It could deceive me for years to come just because I want to believe there's hope for _mija."_

"Or you could dispose of it now."

This was the woman who had helped me through the worst of the contractions and who had been the first to hold my daughter. It was frightening that she could speak so casually of putting a new life to death.

Then again, it had taken me most of the night to fall asleep again. By the time I had dozed off relucantly, I was thinking of the creature as her again. That impulse had faded in the morning light, but it could return.

"I can't dispose of it," I whispered. "I can't let it starve and I can't think of putting it to death for the crime of living. Not after all that I went through for Noemi."

"Make it a foundling, then," she suggested more urgently. "Even now, it could be a danger to you. If you left it for one of the Healers, we could find you a place where they would never find you."

Lily was one of the ones who saw no peaceable ending to this conflict. It was too much her nature to think of everything in terms of all or nothing and this was no exception.

"I've been thinking," I said instead. "It can only grow as steadily as Noemi. That means I have years to gain its confidence. Maybe by then, there will be no reason for it to turn against me."

"Or maybe..." Her breath hitched. "Maybe you'll realize too late that you should have listened to me today."

I was fairly certain that I was supposed to be the pessimist here, but Lily hadn't been here all night. She hadn't been the one to fight the temptation to smother the thing posing as her daughter.

"I'm fairly sure you're the one who said both good and bad parenting was something to take one day at a time," I said. "No matter what happens years from now, we're still on day six."

Lily studied me closely for a long moment as if trying to prove a hypothesis right. She shook her head and glanced at the crib.

"The ones interrogated say they like taking children because there is less resistance," she said almost desperately. "Whoever you think is in there with the creature, she doesn't have much of a fighting chance."

I reached a fingertip through the bars of the crib and gave one chubby cheek a conciliatory caress.

"Noemi is her father's daughter and has me to teach her," I concluded. "Whatever is in there with her has no idea how much of a fighting chance she could have."

Lily's mouth turned up at the edges for the first smile of the day. "We'll see," she said. "For now, it can't hurt us."

That seemed to be the last word on the argument. A moment later, she glanced back at the plastic bags which she had left on the floor beside the bed.

"You like your omelets with peppers, right?"

"If they're fresh," I agreed.

"Stay here," she instructed. "Noemi will need feeding soon and we don't want either of you going without."

She left the room as if we had not just spoken of murder and betrayal or hope and faith. For Lily, it was a compromise between "I told you so" and "You were right."

I slid onto my knees and slid my hand through the bar to reacquaint myself with how her skin felt against my knuckles.

"I owe you half a lullaby, _mija," _I said quietly. "It's not much of one, but it'll have to do for now..."

_ And when the night is cloudy, there is still a light, that shines on me,  
shine until tomorrow, let it be.  
I wake up to the sound of music, mother Mary comes to me,  
speaking words of wisdom, let it be. _


	2. Chapter 2

"When did you first start to suspect something?"

It was a common question for all of us living in these times. In twenty years or so, it might even replace questions about the Kennedy assassination or 9/11. For now, it was the first time we'd really talked about it.

"I was watching a Red Sox-Yankees game," James explained while maneuvering a dumpling between his chopsticks. "Playing a home game at Fenway and I was up by the Green Monster. Of all the people wearing the Sox colors, half of them were chanting 'Yankees suck' and the other half were saying 'I say, those chaps aren't quite so bad as we've heard.'"

Lily choked on her Coke and started giggling. "They were _not._"

"Well, not those words exactly, but it was like half the park had just taken their valium," he countered. "I've been going to Sox games for fifteen years and I've never seen anything like it."

"Yeah," she agreed. "No one in their right mind would say that about the Yankees."

"When Dice-K hit a batter in the seventh and the Yankees fans were saying 'it could happen to anyone,' I had to get out of there," he said with a wounded air. "I hated to miss a perfectly good bloodbath, but they were just ruining it for the rest of us."

Lily grinned and grabbed the last egg roll. "Did you notice they have one at Happy House?"

James nodded solemnly. "That blonde cashier who used to giggle all the time?"

"Yeah," she chortled. "I thought she'd had a wok fall on her head, but it seems she got a personality transplant instead."

"You're terrible," I accused. "It's a good thing Noemi can't hear you or she'll be terribly biased against humans."

Lily waved a hand dismissively. "If she hasn't turned against us after three weeks of listening to you sing, I trust her for now."

Actually, she seemed to have lost her affection for my 'lullabies.' In an attempt to be an educational mother—I was a 7th-grade English teacher on maternity leave after all—I had started playing my lone Mozart CD to put her to sleep. She seemed to like the violin concertos and it got me out of torturing an innocent.

It was much easier to talk about this sort of thing in private. When you weren't looking over your shoulder or wondering if the bespectacled UMass coed at the next table over was actually a Seeker, you could remember the funny things about this whole mess.

"What about you?" James asked me.

"It was at the grocery store," I informed him. "The cashier smiled at me, offered to carry my groceries and didn't even ask me out for drinks afterwards."

"All right," Lily said with a shudder. "That's definitely more bizarre than nice Yankees fans."

I grinned. "Definitely. What's your story?"

She set down her plate—it wouldn't be a Lily story without extraneous hand gestures.

"Picture this," she said quietly as if she were telling a spook story. "It's rush hour on a Friday night, I'm stuck on the Mass Pike as usual and this guy cuts me off. I accidentally rear-end him and we pull over to the shoulder. He gets out and he's this big guy, probably played linebacker for BC or something like that. He comes over, shakes my hand and says 'Please forgive me. You most certainly were not at fault.' He gave me his phone number so that he could pay for any repairs I needed."

"Did you call him?" I asked.

"Of course not," she replied. "I thought I was imagining him and I was convinced that whoever acted like that was either a space alien or intending to do more than lend a helping hand."

I held up a hand. There had been a quiet wail, cut off almost immediately and replaced by an indignant kind of sniffling.

"She's up," I said.

Sure enough, Noemi was watching the door when I opened it. She squirmed, but didn't cry. A quick check confirmed it was time for a diaper change.

"Is this the first world where you weren't implanted into a potty-trained being?" I teased as I carried her to the changing table.

She glowered at me, looking just like Josue at that point or maybe just practicing her human facial expressions. Maybe she just looked like a sulky baby. Most sulky infants did more crying than this. It was one of the things that kept me from forgetting the sort of person with whom I kept company.

"If this is what you're like as a happy baby, I'm really looking forward to raising a teenager."

Her nose wrinkled, but I couldn't tell if she disliked the idea of being stuck with me for another thirteen years or if she had as much appreciation for the smell of her soiled diaper as I did.

"It's supposed to stop snowing tomorrow," I informed her as I cleaned her up and replaced the diaper. "If the weather's good enough, I think we should do our Christmas shopping at Copley."

She looked less disgruntled about that—she was probably tired of being cooped up with a worrywart like me. I snapped her onesie up again and lifted her into my arms.

"Much better?"

She drooled her assent all over the shoulder of my sweater as we went back to the living room.

"Everything fine?" Lily asked.

"She's changed," I explained.

I glanced through the doorway to where James was doing dishes. "Where are you going for Christmas?"

"Providence," she said. "Mom's best friend invited us over and we can't refuse a chance to eat good Ukrainian food."

"Lucky you," I responded. "We'll be in Lowell with three vegetarians, a Texan, four nieces, my dad, and my mother who burns Spaghetti-O's."

"Volunteer to help with the cooking and let her spend some quality time with her grandchild," James suggested.

"Or get your mother on the subject of why Lucy needs a man," Lily added.

"Lucy's a lesbian," James reminded her.

"Exactly," Lily said with a shrug. "It should keep them arguing until you do some damage control."

She pulled me into a one-armed hug before kissing Noemi's forehead. 'Don't worry," she confided. "I'll be a phone call away for the entire time."

I returned the hug and then moved to repeat the process with James. "Thanks."

"Is Anne going to be there?" he asked.

"No." I instinctively tightened my grip on Noemi. "I don't know if she can be trusted."

"She's one of them," Lily rejoined. "Maybe she could help you."

"Or she could decide that a host child should not be raised by a human mother and take her away from me."

"Or turn you into one of them," James agreed. "Maybe you're right."

I wasn't so sure myself. Maybe I would be better off trusting one of them from the start. It might raise less suspicion and they might even cooperate with me.

Maybe I didn't want to find out.

"We'll see."

&

The snow had stopped by Noemi's late-night feeding and the snow plows came through not long after that, so our trip went ahead as planned. We caught the commuter rail into North Station and only had to wait a few more minutes for the Green Line train going to Copley.

Noemi played her usual tricks. We had been out a few times together and she knew that, out of self-preservation, she would have to be asleep any time that a stranger wanted to take a look at her. She seemed to be more aware than most, since she would appear to have dozed off before I even saw a little old grandmother wanting to take a look at my 'sweetest little thing.'

I decided fairly early on that, whatever her role in her last host, this one was probably a celebrity. It was the only way that I could explain how she had a much higher tolerance for staring than I would have had if I were an immortal creature in a five-week-old's brain.

Maybe she was starting to develop a sense of threats. It was difficult to think of her having intuition, but I didn't know much about these beings. They might have started with a clean slate every time or they might have the memory of every previous lifetime.

Noemi behaved herself while I found Mom's favorite perfume, shopped at BabyGap and lusted after several items in the Gucci store. It wasn't until we arrived at the bookstore that she began to get irritable. I had her in a baby bjork so I could keep my hands relatively free and she kept flailing her arms at the shelves.

"Did you like to read?" I murmured. "I don't even know if you come from a place with a written alphabet."

She grunted unhappily as I twisted away from a shelf so that she couldn't grab at anything. "Sorry," I muttered. "They don't like it when someone with gummy fingers paws their merchandise."

For Dad, I found a Jack Ryan thriller. Lucy was addicted to historical romances and would be getting a dubious-looking book on Cleopatra. Mary Anne would be getting the book on Renoir. Jessica of the multiple kids and one on the way was getting a Mercer Mayer book to share with the whole family. Her husband was getting _The Screwtape Letters_.

Without thinking about it, I reached for a book on coral reefs. Anne had aspired to be a marine biologist, but had decided on photography when she realized she had no real talent for that field. It was exactly the sort of thing she would have liked. I let it fall open to a richly-colored photograph of the ocean near Melbourne, Australia.

There was another sniffle from Noemi, louder this time and I immediately glanced down to see if she was trying to catch my attention. She'd been changed recently and fed before we got to Copley, so she might have needed nothing more complicated than comfort.

Instead, she was staring fixedly at the book, her hands reaching for it. As if she sensed my curiosity, she looked up at me with what I could only describe as a wistful expression. It was as if she had seen a picture of home for the first time in a year.

"You like this?" I asked so quietly that I could barely hear myself. "Aunt Anne would like it, too."

Her lips puckered either in pleading or in empathy and she looked back to the book. Without another word, I added it to the stack and carried it to the cashier.

"You find everything you need okay?" the girl asked cheerfully.

"It was fine," I said quickly.

Noemi squirmed and I glanced to my right to see a six-year-old girl and her mother, both with matching silver gleams in their blue eyes. They both looked away, but I immediately wondered if the girl had recognized one of her own. Neither turned around, but I barely heard the total as I handed over my American Express card.

"Behave yourself," I chided more to myself than to Noemi.

"Here are your books," the cashier said, shoving a bag across the counter. "Have a great holiday."

"You, too."

I had planned on doing shopping for myself, so that I would have something stylish or at least not resembling a tent to wear for the Christmas Eve party. Since Noemi was behaving herself, I even had planned to stop at the Boston Public Library. That near-brush with the others had rattled me, however, and I beat a hasty retreat to the Copley Station.

I half-expected to see the girl and her mother following us on the subway, but it was 3 p.m. two days before Christmas and we had very little company until we boarded the commuter rail. Noemi had helpfully actually fallen asleep on the subway and I didn't bother to move her from the bjork to the carrier. I popped an Altoid into my mouth just to keep myself alert and pulled out my Jane Greene book, since it wouldn't do to sleep through my stop.

I had gotten three pages into Chapter 4 when a shoulder bag landed on the seat next to me and I glanced up to see a face straight out of my nightmares.

Rides the Wind hadn't bothered to change much about Anne's appearance. She and I had been identical twins, so I recognized my narrow chin and curly auburn hair. Except for the ring of silver in her eye, I could have been looking into a mirror.

"This seat's taken," I said brusquely.

"Don't be petty," Rides snapped. "I'm not going to hurt you."

"Oh, really?" I challenged. "You've obviously been following me."

"Monitoring," she corrected. "There's a significant difference."

I instinctively and ridiculously moved to the end of the seat so that my back was against the oblong window. Of course, this wouldn't do much good against a Seeker, but it made me feel better.

"Not with your kind."

She stayed in place, her jaw set. "In most cases, a soul who has taken a host is assigned to a Comforter to ease the transition. It is a bond that you might see between a patient and therapist or a client and a caseworker."

My arms wrapped around Noemi as if I could protect the creature inside her from her own species. "You knew," I said flatly. "Was it your idea?"

She kept her gaze on me so that I could see no lie in her eyes. "No," she said firmly. "I do not like the idea of implanting in a newborn in spite of conventional wisdom. It was your friend Lily's assistant."

This was the same assistant who had quit in order to take another job just after Thanksgiving.

"Am I supposed to be comforted by that?" I demanded. "Your kind are all the same..."

She arched an eyebrow with an expression that was patently Anne's. "Is that what you believe?" she asked in kind. "When you are raising her, you will undoubtedly watch for any sign that she resembles you or your husband. You will look for anything that links her to you, but you will learn what traits are the soul's. You will learn to love those quirks as much as the things that make her _your_ daughter."

"You sound as if you speak from experience," I muttered.

"I've seen it happen on other worlds," she explained. "You don't go through six hosts without learning a few things about maternal instincts."

I wanted to argue that she knew nothing about me. She may have been given access to all of Anne's memories, but she was one of them. She couldn't possibly understand me at _all._

A moment later, my mind caught up to one of her earlier statements and my grip on Noemi slackened just a little.

"You said when I am raising her," I whispered. "You intend to keep her with me?"

Her mouth twitched, but she didn't smile. "I said that most cases are handled by a Comforter," she reiterated. "Since it will be some time before she can communicate with us, you are as good a comforter as any."

"And in the future?" I insisted. "When she's had more time with me, will you want to take me as well just so there isn't a conflict between what her mother has taught her and what she should think?"

I saw something resembling a guilty flinch and it once again reminded me of Anne rather than Rides. "We have not decided yet," she said formally. "This is still a highly experimental situation."

"Glad to hear that we're good little lab rats," I snorted. "Why are you here?"

"I was curious," she admitted. "You are the first human with a host child whom I have seen choose to keep the child. Everything that I know from Anne suggests that you have good reason for doing so. I wanted to see for myself what sort of commitment looked like."

"And what does it look like?" I asked defensively.

She smiled at that. "I would have never guessed that you knew," she assured me. "However you feel about the soul, you treat that child in your arms as your daughter. It's quite touching."

Something about that was actually a relief. My family might see the same connection if the person who saw me through Anne's eyes could.

"Do you know anything about…the soul?"

"I do," she said. "We have records of all assignments. This is only her second life, but she specifically requested to start from the beginning as a human. It was an unusual request, since it took away most of her abilities."

"Why did she request it?"

Rides tilted her chin towards Noemi. "You'll have to ask her that. I cannot give you an adequate answer."

"Do you at least know what the soul's name is?" I asked.

She didn't answer, but reached into her shoulder bag and removed several small packages. "I found these in Anne's things," she stated. "Out of respect for her, I would like to make sure that they get to the correct people."

There were ones for each of my immediate family and two for me. I thought it rich that Rides wanted to 'respect' anything about Anne or her family, but she was being remarkably polite. It wasn't a good idea to antagonize her.

"Thank you," I said with as much sincerity as I could muster. "I hope that Anne has a Merry Christmas."

At that, she stood and shouldered her bag before retreating to the door of the car. "I have to be going," she said. "I have a meeting in Swampscott."

It was an excuse. She had grown uncomfortable at my benediction. Still, it got rid of the thing masquerading as my twin sister.

"You won't answer my question?" I pressed on.

She hesitated at the door. "Clears Waters," she replied frankly. "Maybe if we see each other again, I'll tell you how she earned that name."

"Noemi means 'joyful,'" I answered. "I hope she earns that name as well."

"I hope you will give you the opportunity to do so, Bekah," she responded.

And with that, she was gone.


	3. Chapter 3

My Honda didn't get great gas mileage and smelled like cabbage on a rainy day, but it had a few redeeming features. Namely, it had great climate control, a great sound system and had come out of several fender benders in fairly good condition. That meant that by the time we got to my parents' house in Lowell, we were still in one piece and warm and had been listening to good music the whole way there. In effect, we were in great shape.

Of course, Matt had to disagree. I wasn't sure exactly how my sister had fallen for someone who had to have an opposing opinion about _everything, _but Matt had never quite grown out of that phase.He was waiting outside the door with a disapproving expression by the time I turned off the ignition.

"I can't believe you're still driving this bucket of bolts," he sniffed. "Don't you have _any_ self-respect?"

Self-respect had nothing to do with living on a schoolteacher's salary. He just worked as a car salesman and was convinced that I should make peace with a nice little Dodge Stratus.

"I have plenty of self-respect," I responded. "I just happen to like this bucket of bolts and it's got another 70,000 miles of good driving in it."

"Ah, Beks," he sighed, pulling me into a bear hug. "I love having an optimist in the family."

He knew perfectly well that I was right. He also knew that I hated being called Beks, but this was Matt. Somewhere in the pre-nuptial agreement, he had made it his right to be an idiot when he wanted to be.

I squirmed free after an appropriate amount of time. "Noemi thought it was a smooth ride," I pointed out. "She slept the whole time."

Actually, she'd made a hilarious attempt at waving her arms in time to "Hips Don't Lie" and squalled when I put on ABBA. I'd stubbornly made her listen to "Dancing Queen" and "Winner Takes it All" before she finally conceded that it wasn't half-bad and stopped sulking.

"Good," he said. "Maybe she'll be in a good mood when her aunts want to cuddle her to death."

"One can hope," I agreed.

I turned her carrier so he could get a good look at her. He bent down and squinted at her for a long moment before straightening up with a satisfied "huh."

"Not bad, Beks," he commended. "She doesn't look like you at all."

Irked, I elbowed him in the ribs. "Quiet or I'll make you demonstrate your diaper-changing skills."

He just flashed a wicked grin and grabbed our bags before heading up the walk to the front door.

"Beks is here!" he shouted as if no one in the house were capable of noticing a car out front.

Mom was the first one to swoop in. She hugged me, kissed my forehead and immediately confiscated her granddaughter.

Lucy was next and less enthusiastic. "Glad you made it," she commented. "Can I have her next?"

"Sure," I sighed. "I have to warn you that she might not be too entertaining until she's finished her nap."

"That's fine," she said brightly. "Mary Anne's not here yet."

I wasn't looking forward to what being passed around would do to Noemi. She had tolerated James and Lily fairly well, but this was the first large-group setting that she had been subjected to.

"Did you hit that traffic on I-93?"

Leave it to Dad to skip the greetings and start comparing travel stories. I hugged him first and answered later.

"We ran into some of it," I conceded, "but it wasn't too bad by the time we got on the road."

"You didn't come take that shortcut through..."  
"Bekah!"

Saved by the sister. Jessica let go after a few moments, but by that time, Dad had wandered into the kitchen in search of eggnog.

"Come on," she invited. "Matt's got your stuff in your old room and we can talk while you change."

I had finally unearthed an old dress from Lord and Taylor that still fit pretty well. It was a red knee-length dress that hid a lot of flaws and was suitably dressy for our annual Christmas Eve party.

Jess sat on the bed and kept up a running conversation until I was finished dressing. It was a relief to be around someone who expected me to do the least amount of talking.

"…And Mary Anne's bringing Scott," she concluded as I finished with the buttons. "Lucy's not happy that she's the only one not bringing a date, but that's her own fault for getting rid of Elsa a month ago."

"I didn't bring anyone," I countered.

"You brought a baby," she laughed. "You and she will be entertained or entertaining all night."

That was exactly what I was afraid of. If Noemi drew any attention to herself, it might not be of the sort everyone was expecting.

"I'm not sure I'll keep her down there for long," I said evasively. "She's not comfortable in crowds yet."

Jess nodded sympathetically. "Josh was the same way," she confided.

I highly doubted that.

"How's she doing?"

"She's healthy and sleeping better," I stated as I pulled on nylons. "She hasn't discovered colic yet."

"Well, you look great," Jess assured me.

"It's easier to take off baby weight when you're the only one in charge," I explained.

Jess grimaced sympathetically. "About that," she said. "We're not that far away. If you want, we could come over once a week and just sort of help out."

The thought of Jess, Matt and their four kids invading my house was _not_ something particularly comforting. Still, I had to be polite.

"Thanks," I said with a smile. "I'll let you know."

With that, we headed back downstairs. Mom had unstrapped Noemi and was in the process of trying to get her to wake up. This mostly involved baby talking at her and wasn't terribly effective.

"She doesn't respond to that, Mom," I informed her.

"Of course she does," Mom argued. "She's my widdle cutie and she wants to see her gwandma, doesn't she?"

"It's my turn," Lucy announced before this nonsense could go any further.

Mom reluctantly gave her up with a final babbled syllable and headed to the kitchen to bother Dad about his cholesterol. This was certainly turning into the standard McMillan family Christmas.

"Noemi," Lucy said calmly, "I would be honored if you would deign to join us."

I laughed at that. "She's my daughter, not a head of state," I teased. "There's got to be a happy medium…"

"Hey, it worked!"

Noemi had pried one eye open to squint in annoyance at whoever had interrupted her nap. Then she closed it again, but her breathing did not steady again.

"Oh, god," Lucy chuckled. "That looked just like you."

It was true that I tended to do that in a similar situation, but I was immensely relieved that she hadn't chosen that moment to stare at her aunt with both eyes open.

"I need to get her changed for tonight," I said. "Want to help?"

"Sure," Lucy said. "Do you want…"

"You can take her upstairs," I offered. "If you're going to be her godmother, she might as well get used to you."

Lucy's jaw dropped open at that, but it only took a few more moments for her to regain her senses.

"All right," she said calmly. "We can talk about that upstairs."

We settled Noemi on the bed between us as I rummaged through her bag for her holiday dress.

"Sorry I haven't visited," Lucy said genuinely. "You know how Dad gets about us traveling these days."

"I do," I confirmed. "I'm surprised he didn't drive out and get us himself."

She grinned. "He almost did," she informed me, "but Mom said that the Seekers might even be at office holiday parties."

"Good point."

I finally found the green velvet dress that Josue had picked out two weeks before he died. I unsnapped Noemi and began peeling the onesie off. She didn't stir and I started to suspect that we'd bored her to sleep again.

"She's so sweet," Lucy sighed. "Is she always like this?"

"Only when she's trying to make a good impression," I said honestly. "When she wants to, she can be quite stubborn."

"Just like the two of us," she observed. "Are you sure you don't want someone more…tame as her godmother?"

"No," I said firmly. "I want you because you can help her understand what it's like to be different."

Lucy frowned. "Different," she echoed. "She hasn't expressed any same-sex preferences already, has she?"

"No." I leaned over and stroked Noemi's cheek. "It's all right. We can trust her."

Noemi opened her eyes immediately. Lucy sat frozen in place with her eyes wide for a long moment. Finally, she opened her mouth and after a few false starts, said something.

"Oh."

At least she didn't lash out or overreact. This was a good start.

"When did it happen?" she asked quietly.  
"I don't know exactly," I confessed. "I found out on the first night that I brought her home from the hospital."

"Oh." She closed her eyes for a moment and I could see her eyes going damp. "Why didn't you tell me?"

_Maybe because I still haven't figured out the right words to explain this?_

"It's not the sort of thing you mention between Red Sox scores and family gossip."

She glanced towards the door as if she expected an angry horde to burst through at any moment. "Do any of them know?"

"No," I said quickly. "I was going to tell them before the party."

She nodded. "Better to make sure that they don't find out the hard way."

There wasn't any way of telling my family that couldn't be described as the hard way, but I knew what she meant. It would be much better to deal with their shock or disapproval now than to have someone notice during the festivities.

"Well," she considered, "Mary Anne should be here in a few minutes. Do you want to tell them then?"

"As good a time as any," I agreed.

By the time we got Noemi changed, Mary Anne and her fiancé Scott had arrived. Mom tried to take Noemi again, but I stepped back.

"Can we talk for a minute?" I requested.

"Sure," she said. "We should have privacy if we go to the office…"

"I meant all of us," I corrected.

Mom sighed at the fact that she would have to wait even longer to monopolize my attention. "Go to the living room," she instructed. "I'll get the others."

Lucy and I took the love seat with the others scattered on various chairs and couches around the room. Someone had forgotten to include the kids, but it might be better to do this on a smaller scale first.

"What's going on?" Dad asked immediately.

"I need to tell you something."

I was so nervous that I was stating the obvious. I took a deep breath to calm myself.

"The night that I brought Noemi home from the hospital, I noticed something," I began.

Their faces all went slightly slack and I knew they were thinking of everything from birth defects to some kind of handicap.

"She's a healthy, intelligent baby," I rushed on. "More so than usual."

"Well, that's good," Mom interrupted.

"Mom," I said, "please."

She must have heard something in my tone because she took Dad's hand and looked as if she were bracing herself for the worst. The last time I had seen her this way was when Scott asked for permission to marry Mary Anne.

"I don't know when it happened, but Noemi became a host," I finally blurted.

There was absolute silence for a long moment. Finally, it was Matt who said something. "Like Anne."

"Somewhat," I confirmed.

"And you're _keeping_ it?" Dad challenged.

Mom pulled away from him. "Are you sure?" she asked quietly.

I nodded, unable to work words past the tightness in my throat.

"That thing is a threat to us," Dad snapped. "I can't believe you brought it into our house."

"She can't even take care of herself yet," Mom shot back. "How do you think she's a threat to us?"

I was relieved to hear that Mom was taking our side on this, but no one else had weighed in. I turned a pleading look on Lucy and she grimaced.

"You wanted to adopt a Vietnamese child after the war," she pointed out. "How's that any different?"

It was an argument that I had not yet thought of. Dad had spent a year in Viet Nam and still knew the difference between the Viet Cong and the innocents. If he could see something similar in this situation, it might be a good thing.

"A Vietnamese baby wouldn't have grown up wanting to betray us," Dad protested.

"You don't know that Noemi will," Lucy insisted. "Anne hasn't turned us over to her kind."

"Leave her out of this," he ordered.

"No," I interjected. "We can't leave her out of this. Noemi isn't anything like Rides the Winds. By the time she'll be able to speak and act for herself, she'll have been around us for years. It would be difficult for that to not make a difference."

"I don't think it's safe for it to spend years getting used to us," Dad said. "She could join our side eventually or she could decide to make us just like her when she's old enough to inform on us."

"We can't decide now what she will do then," I argued.

"Why not?" he retorted. "They decided to take over because they saw that some of us were monsters."

"And you think condemning my daughter for that is any different?" I shot back. "If you're looking for a high ground, you're not doing very well."

The room fell silent again. Three of the family members had stated their positions. The others were trying to decide what side to take. Instinctively, I held Noemi a little more tightly.

"She's my niece," Jessica said finally. "No matter what is control of her, she's family. Personally, I'm in favor of taking a chance on her."

"Me, too," Mary Anne agreed firmly.

"And what if she becomes a threat?" Dad reiterated, staring at me.

"In that case, I will put as much distance as necessary between us and you," I said flatly. "I'm not interested in putting anyone at risk. That includes her and it includes you."

It was a difficult thing to ask of either of us, but it was the only answer that would satisfy him.

"This can work out," I said quietly by way of conclusion, looking at Matt and Scott for input.

Finally, Matt's stony expression melted. "Ah, Beks," he echoed his earlier statement. "I love having an optimist in the family."

I hesitantly returned his grin. "Are you in?"

"Of course," he promised.

"I trust Mary Anne's judgment," Scott added. "I'm in."

I bit my lip and nodded with as much dignity as I could muster. Not all of them were convinced yet and I wasn't celebrating this victory until he changed his mind.

The vote only left Dad in dissent and he was looking slightly rattled that no one but him had any sense. Acting on an instinct, I stood and crossed to the couch where he and Mom were sitting. He didn't resist when I handed Noemi to him, which was the first good sign.

"She has your chin," I said quietly. "She has my mouth and Mom's hands. We can teach her everything else she needs to know."

He shook his head, but it wasn't in disagreement. Instead, I finally saw a hint of a smile on his face.

"I can't believe you're asking this of us," he said with only a hint of the earlier edge in his voice.

"I didn't exactly have a choice," I reminded him. "The only one we have is whether or not to accept her for who and what she is."

"And you think you've made the right choice?" he asked.

"I know I have," I insisted. "What about you?"

He sighed and shifted his granddaughter into a more comfortable position. "All right," he conceded. "I'll side with the rest of you."

Relieved beyond words, I kissed his forehead and hugged him awkwardly. A ripple of laughter went through the room.

"What did I tell you?" Mary Anne asked Scott. "Bekah could always convince Dad of anything she wanted."

"That's because she has more sense than I do at times," Dad called out. "Who wants eggnog?"

That broke the tension in the room and Mom stood to fetch mugs. I slid into her vacated spot and wrapped an arm around Dad's shoulders.

"Thank you."

He nodded and handed Noemi back so he could stand up. "I hope you're right about her."

I tried to keep a grin on my face, but shrugged. "We'll see."

That was all we had to know for now.


End file.
